“Where there is sorrow there is holy ground.” — Oscar Wilde
The Grove is a reading circle for creatives and community seekers. We gather monthly to carve out a cozy space for quiet reading, intentional conversation, and connection.
As practitioners it can be difficult to find time to read and we’re often in the role of facilitating. The Grove is spacious and focused on nourishment. You are welcome to read the book before we meet, but it isn’t necessary. Our curator, Kate Creech, will select an excerpt (or a few) and we’ll take time to read quietly on our own, before transitioning into a discussion/learning space. There is ample permission to relax, receive, and surrender the pressure to say something ‘smart’!
Our featured book for December is The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief
by Francis Weller.
Weller writes that “…grief offers a wild alchemy that transmutes suffering into fertile ground. We are made real and tangible by the experience of sorrow, adding substance and weight to our world. We are stripped of excess and revealed as human in our times of grief. In a very real way grief ripens us, pulls up from the depths of our souls what is most authentic in our beings. In truth, without some familiarity with sorrow, we do not mature as men and women. It is the broken heart, the heart that knows sorrow that is also capable of genuine love.”
Our reading circle will create space to enter the sacred ground of grief and spend time with Weller reflections and rituals for tending to and transmuting grief.
Feel free to bring a journal for notes and a small object to help you connect with yourself a bit deeper. As always there will be time to read the chapter that we will be discussing or you can simply marinate in the words (if an introverted evening is needed!) and no pressure to read it before hand or prepare anything. Simply show up and bring your lovely self! We look forward to being together.
Timing
Our gathering will loosely follow this flow:
7:00 — Arrive + get cozy
7:10 — Setting the frame
7:15 — Quiet reading
7:50 — Conversation
8:30 — Space for casual connection
Tea and chocolate will be provided. You are welcome to bring snacks, wine, or your favorite beverage to share.
Registration
$7 suggested exchange for the general public
Registration fee is included for collective members
Please RSVP by Noon the day of the gathering so we can prepare the space for you. We will also share access to the selected excerpts that we will be reading together so you can download to your favorite reading device for print copies to bring with you.
We encourage you to support the author and your favorite local bookstore by purchasing the book, before or after the circle. We love our building-mates Ardunsel Books.
Kate Creech
Psychotherapist & Circle Curator
Kate is a therapist and visual artist. She is excited to curate this circle because books offer a space for us to connect and create the space to process (or simply be) with others in the daunting questions we often face as humans/healers/creatives, etc
Learn more about Kate
The Wild Edge of Sorrow
From Francis Weller’s website:
Grief has always been communal, always been shared and consequently has traditionally been regarded as a sacred process. Too often in modern times our grief becomes private, carrying an invisible mantle of shame forcing our sorrow underground, hidden from the eyes that would offer healing. We must restore the conversation we need to have concerning the place of grief in our lives. Each of us must undertake an apprenticeship with loss. Join us as we share our stories of loss, death and suffering, both personal and communal. Utilizing the powerful tools of writing practice, singing, movement and community ritual, we will coax our stories into the visible world where they can be held within the healing embrace of community. Come experience the joy that is found when sorrow has been made sacred.
Francis Weller
Francis Weller, MFT, is a psychotherapist, writer and soul activist. He is a master of synthesizing diverse streams of thought from psychology, anthropology, mythology, alchemy, indigenous cultures and poetic traditions. Author of The Wild Edge of Sorrow: Rituals of Renewal and the Sacred Work of Grief; The Threshold Between Loss and Revelation, (with Rashani Réa) and In the Absence of the Ordinary: Essays in a Time of Uncertainty, he has introduced the healing work of ritual to thousands of people. He founded and directs WisdomBridge, an organization that offers educational programs that seek to integrate the wisdom from indigenous cultures with the insights and knowledge gathered from western poetic, psychological, and spiritual traditions.
—Learn more about Francis